1947-06-18, #3: Doctors' Trial (early afternoon)

AFTERNOON SESSION (The hearing reconvened at 1330 hours, 18 June 1947.)

THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.

THE PRESIDENT: Counsel may proceed.

EUGEN HAAGEN — Resumed
DIRECT EXAMINATION (Continued)

BY DR. TIPP:

Q: Professor, before the recess you said that you began your work in the field of typhus on your own initiative and that in the curse of this work you attained research assignments from the Medical Inspector of the Luftwaffe as well as the Reichs Research Counsel; now could I ask you if in your applications made before the various assignments were issued, were any details given about the work which you planned to carry out or the work which you already had carried out?

A: No details were given, of course, merely the problem as such was dealt with.

Q: You have already described to the Tribunal your work on this problem, it was to find a vaccine produced from living virus, a virus no longer pathogenic for human beings which however contained the qualities of the virus.

A: Yes that is true. Our work was limited to the development of a living vaccine and this work was based on the great experiences of foreign offices, especially the French scientific Blanc; the technical side was always carried out in animal experiments.

Q: Now, witness, did you succeed in finding a vaccine of the type described?

A: Yes we did succeed from a so-called murine typhus virus strain, from rat typhus we developed such a vaccine. The weakling was brought about through animal experiments through cultivation in chicken eggs and thirdly through conservation procedure.

Q: Was this vaccine then tested for its effectiveness and if so, how?

A: Yes, the vaccine was tested for its effectiveness, first, of course, by animal experiments for its immunizing qualities. After this quality had been proven the first vaccinations were undertaken in order to test the effectiveness and the tolerance on human beings. This was done on volunteers.

Q: Where did you get these volunteers, Professor?

A: First of all I served myself, then the members of my institute and a number of students of the University.

Q: Now will you please tell the purpose of these experiments?

A: When one has produced a new vaccine one must test not only its effectiveness, but also its tolerability. That can be done only on human beings, animal experiments are not sufficient. At a certain stage it always becomes necessary to try it on human beings.

Q: In these vaccinations on members of the institute and students, you tested the tolerability of the vaccine; the immunizing effect of the vaccine, if I understood you correct, could not be proven by these experiments?

A: Yes, the immunizing effect can also be determined. One needs merely to make the Weil-Felix reaction, which has been mentioned in this trial, to make sure in the body serum there are protective oodles against the typhus germ. This test, I mention this because mistakes have been made here, is used not only to diagnose the disease, but also to check its immunity reaction to find the protective bodies after vaccination.

Q: We will come back to that later, witness. Now when did you achieve your aim, when did you have a vaccine of the type described and when did you develop it so far that it could be used?

A: In the spring of 1943.

Q: And when was this vaccine first used actually on a large scale or when was it first used at all?

A: The first vaccinations were carried out in May of 1943 in the Schirmeck internment camp, which belonged to the Natzweiler concentration camp. The vaccinations were performed on persons in special danger.

Q: This morning, witness, you mentioned the request of a camp doctor of the Natzweiler Concentration Camp and Schirmeck was no doubt under him; may I ask whether these Schirmeck vaccinations go back to the request of the camp physician?

A: I do not quite understand your question.

A: Please tell me whether the vaccinations performed in Schirmeck originated with the request of the camp physician?

A: Yes, Schirmeck and Natzweiler belong together. My vaccinations there were in connection with all the work of the camp.

Q: Then you used this vaccine for the first time in May of 1943 in Schirmek. How many persons did you vaccinate?

A: Twenty-eight persons were vaccinated altogether.

Q: Did you have any influence on the selection of these persons; that is, were these persons selected by you, or who selected them?

A: I did not have any direct influence on the selection of these persons, only to that extent that I told the camp administrator and the camp doctor that we could only vaccinate people who were in a more or less good condition of health, since if this were not the case it would not correspond, to our German vaccination laws. To that extent I did have some influence.

The selection was made according to the point of view that persons in special danger of typhus were selected, persons who were in the so called east block of the camp. New transports were always coming from the East, lice infected, for the most part, so that one could court on a considerable typhus danger. In this mart of the camp the danger was greater than in the parts of the camp where there were Germans and Alsatians who did not come from the East.

Q: You said, witness, the persons were selected from the group of prisoners in special danger of contracting typhus. You just mentioned the east block. Can you tell us what nationality these persons were?

A: As far as I can remember they were of various nationalities, There were a quite number of them who spoke German, so that one could talk to them well.

Q: Now, witness, I should like to ask you to describe how these vaccinations were carried out. Perhaps a preliminary question first. Why did you vaccinate only 28 persons? Why did you not vaccinate all the inmates of the camps there?

A: At first I could produce the vaccine only in very small quantities. My laboratory facilities were very limited. If I had wanted to vaccinate a whole camp I would have had to have a production workshop.

That is the reason why we vaccinated only a small number of people.

Q: Now, Professor, please describe how the vaccinations were performed.

A: Vaccinations were performed on 28 persons altogether, in several groups. The first vaccination was of eight persons. They were given one injection of 0.5 CC of the vaccine into the breast muscle in the customary manner.

The second group consisted of 20 persons, divided into two sub-groups of ten each. The first group — Let's call this Group A — was also given 0.5 CC of the vaccine intramuscularly.

Sub-group B, the last ten persons, were first given a vaccination of 0.5 CC of a killed typhus vaccine produced in the Robert Koch Institute. Then, eight days later, there was a second vaccination with a living vaccine, a arm 0.5, intramuscularly. I should like to say that the first vaccination with the killed vaccine, which I have just mentioned, was performed for two reasons: first of all, in order to be able to compare and see whether this preliminary examination produced more antibodies; and, in the second place, whether this preliminary examination with killed vaccine might cause any reactions or might reduce the reactions of the living vaccine.

At the same time, I carried out protective vaccinations on persons outside of the camp, on volunteers. They were again performed in such a way that there were three injections this time: the first, 6.25, the second 0.25, and the third injection 0.5 CC, of the living vaccine.

Q: The court will be especially interested, witness, in the reactions of the persons after this vaccination. Can you tell us that?

A: In the first group of eight persons who were given 0.5 CC of the living vaccine only once, three had a reaction that was a short fever of over 39 degrees. The rest of the persons, however, had no reaction.

In the second group, among the ten persons in Group A there were no noticeable reactions. In the other group there were very negligible symptoms, in some cases only a headache and dejection.

Typical symptoms of typhus, brain symptoms or vessel symptoms, and other symptoms, did not appear in any case.

The same was true of the third group. Here again there was no reaction.

I must say in this connection that I used a vaccine produced from rat typhus virus, I must point that out because later, in Natzweiler, I used the classic epidemic or louse typhus virus vaccine.

Q: Professor, after the vaccination did you watch the well being of the persons vaccinated?

A: Yes, of course. After the vaccination I was in the camp frequently, I looked at the persons who had been vaccinated and was taken at their fever charts. After four weeks a final blood sample was taken to perform the Weil-Felix reaction and to see by it what degree of immunity they had developed.

Q: Professor, you have already mentioned the Weil-Felix reaction, May I assume there the test for immunization was performed by the WeilFelix reaction?

A: Yes, The immunity test was performed with this serological reactions, the Weil-Felix reaction. I believe it has already been discussed here, so that I need not describe it again.

Q: Perhaps you will tell us briefly, Professor, what is determined in the Weil-Felix reaction expressed in figures.

A: You hear the term "titer value" —

MR. HARDY: Your Honor, I missed one point. He spoke of three groups. I didn't get the third group; I had an interruption there and didn't hear what the third group was. Could he repeat that please?

THE WITNESS: The third group was eight persons who were vaccinated in three periods, the first injection being 0.25 CC, the second 0.25 CC, and the third 0.5 CC of the living vaccine.

BY DR. TIPP:

Q: And that was the group of volunteers?

A: Yes, that was the group of volunteers.

Q: Very well, witness.

You were interrupted when you were speaking of the titer values. Will you please explain what that is?

A: In the serological determination of immunity, a certain amount of the bacteria are brought together with a certain serum. The serum is diluted, and the highest dilution which is reached we call the final titer, and that is used. If a dilution of one to five hundred gives a reaction that is an agglutination, that is the titer.

I believe that is enough.

Q: You said that after the vaccinations you determined the immunity of the various persons from the blood serum, I assume that was done by determining the titer values. I don't believe that the Court is interested in the individual figures, professor, I should merely like to know what was determined about the Immunizing effect through this test.

A: The practical result is that with this living vaccine one can achieve a higher degree of immunity, according to the serological reaction, at least, than with the killed typhus vaccine. If I may give some figures —

Q: I don't think that is necessary, witness.

If I am at all informed in this field, witness, these titer values can be determined when a person has survived a real case of typhus. Now, can these Liter values, after vaccination, be compared with the titer values in the blood of a patient after he has survived the disease?

A: Yes, that is possible, I have already said that the reaction is an immunity reaction which can also be determined after disease, but I must say that the test must be performed very soon after the survival of the disease, because the amount of antibodies in the blood is soon reduced. If we want to get the comparative values, then we must make the test very soon after the disease or very soon after the vaccination. Then we can find that, as a rule, persons who have recovered from the disease have a very high titer, of 10,000 or 12,000, perhaps; but those vaccinated with killed vaccines have a titer of only 100. The first results with the living vaccine gave a higher value, up to 2,000.

Q: Then the results were very favorable, witness?

A: The results were quite favorable, yes.

Q: But were they entirely satisfactory, or were you still working on the development of the vaccine?

A: These vaccinations with rat typhus vaccine. The ideal would be to vaccinate lice and typhus with a vaccine produced from lice infected with typhus. We must expect that even though the diseases are closely related, there are certain differences, referring to the degree of etiogenic quality. The aim was to produce a louse vaccine.

Q: After this scientific interruption It us go back to the facts, witness. In the course of these vaccinations at Schirmeek were there any deaths?

A: No, there were no deaths in the vaccinations at Schirmeek.

Q: Witness, your testimony is in contradiction to the testimony of a prosecution witness whom we heard here. This is George Hirz, who testified here on the 8th of January. His testimony is on Page 1310 of the German and 1293 of the English record. Hirz said that at Schirmeek you injected 20 to 25 persons and the following days these had a high fever. The fever is said to have began after 36 to 48 hours and two of these people died.

The witness also said who had vaccinated him, the head of the camp and the Captain the hospital. Will you explain the differences between your testimony and the testimony of Hirz?

A: It is true that these three people, the camp head and the deputy camp head and the nurse, that was Hirz, were vaccinated with the customary vaccine on the basis of an order that camp personnel, where there was any danger of typhus, had to be vaccinated regularly against this disease. Now, the personnel was in much less danger than the inmates themselves; so in order to help the camp doctor, I supplied the vaccine and vaccinated these three persons, but I reserved the living vaccine for he persons who were in real danger. Those were the reasons why there were these alleged distinctions made.

Q: When the prisoners came to the camp they were given a careful examination by the camp doctor. In the interests of preventing disease in the camp, that was necessary. Therefore, here I merely had t o observe that they were free of external symptoms of disease and to determine how strong they were.

Q: Then if I understand you correctly, you say that the medical. examination was performed by the camp doctor, who made them available to you for vaccination?

A: Yes, the camp doctor and the head of the camp, together.

Q: Now, Professor, is the statement of the witness Hirz correct that after 36 to 48 hours these persons had a fever of up to 40 degrees Centigrade, 104 degrees Fahrenheit?

A: I have already said that aside from the first group there was no special reaction, Hirz himself did not know the first group, he says himself. In the second group I just testified there were no fever reactions or any other reaction.

Q: But you said, witness—oh, that was the first group.

A: Yes. And even here the reactions were quite customary such as occur in other vaccinations, too.

Q: But Hirz also says that at the end of the fever, seven to eight days, the persons became disturbed and their speech was interfered with, and in three or four cases they stammered. Do you know anything about that?

A: When I visited these persons I did not observe any such symptoms. None of them complained, and I am sure that if any one observed those symptoms on himself he would immediately go to the doctor. Everyone was interested in doing away with these symptoms, I did not observe any disturbances or stammering. If Hirz had seen them at the time, I am convinced he would have reported them to me. He was a nurse for these persons and was responsible for them; I cannot imagine that he would have fulfilled the interest of these prisoners by keeping these things secret.

Q: You say that neither you observed such symptoms nor did Hirz report them to you. Now, witness, Hirz also said that after two days two of these experimental subjects, as he calls them, or vaccinated persons, as you call them, died. Did you observe this, witness?

A: I have already said that in the smaller experimental group no one died, because I am sure I would have noticed it and I visited there. When I looked at these persons who had been vaccinated I would ordered an autopsy in the case of such deaths to determine what the persons died of. Not only I would have ordered or carried out this autopsy, but the camp administration would have ordered it. One could get the idea that these people perhaps died of typhus. I must say that after a two day incubation period no one has ever died of typhus. The shortest time for deaths, that is the shortest incubation period plus length of disease was ten days to fourteen days. And these early deaths are supposed to be cases with a high pathogenic incidence directly from human beings. For this reason alone it is quite impossible.

Q: Witness, you said that in such cases you would doubtless have had an autopsy performed.

You said you heard nothing abut the deaths, and that therefore there was no autopsy; is that right?

A: Yes, that is correct.

Q: I should like to remind the Court of the testimony of Hirz on Page 1298 of the English record, 1316 of the German record, who said that he immediately wrapped the bodies in paper and had them burned in the crematorium at Natzweiler. Not even the Prosecution witness was able to say, or perhaps did not want to say, how Prof. Haagen reacted to these deaths. Now one more question about this witness Hirz,. Here on the witness stand Hirz was asked:

Now witness, you realized that these experiments performed on the 29 to 25 persons were experiments for the determination of typhus in connection with the typhus disease?

A: Yes, I had not the slightest doubt about it. I have fifteen years of practice behind me.

I do not know, witness, what this testimony means. Perhaps I am not enough of a specialist to judge, but I may assume that you can explain what the contents of these statements is.

A: As to Mr. Hirz's statement, I can only say that I cannot understand it at all. I have no idea what experiments to determine typhus in connection with this disease are supposed to be. First of all, there were no experiments to determine typhus since there was no typhus. And I don't know any method for performing experiments on human beings to determine typhus. If by experiments, one means the removal of blood in the Weil-Felix reaction- that is something else, but that is not what he is talking about here. The witness gives as reason for his expert knowledge, that he had been a pharmacist for 15 years. That he has such a long practice behind him and considers himself an expert then in the field of contagious diseases I don't quite understand that either. But I think one can expect that from a pharmacist—after all, pharmacists do sell vaccines for public diseases in pharmacies, one would really expect him to know what vaccine reactions are and what a real disease is. And then in the first group where a reaction did appear, he didn't know that group at all.

Q: You have already said, witness, something about Mr. Nirz's testimony that the prisoner Atloff told him that what Mr. Hirz describes was the second experiment. It seems to me that supports your statement that Mr.Hirz knew nothing about the first group, that is the eight persons. Can you tel us anything else, Professor, to explain the contradiction between your testimony and that of Mr. Hirz?

A: Hirz speaks only of one injection definitely, not of two. The vaccinated persons whom he took care of all had two injections at intervals of several days. If he had really been interested about the vaccination, he must have known that two injections were performed. That is one point. Then he says that the needles were not changed. He seem to have overlooked something there again: that for every injection a new injection needle was used which was brought from Strassbourg already sterilized, and that the technical assistant changed them, whoever knows anything abut scientific work knows that in such important work one does not use the same needle for several persons, quite aside from the fact that this is one of the most elementary demands of asepses.

Here again he probably didn't observe very carefully.

Q: Now, professor, the question interests us whether in the camp of Schirmeek, through artificial injection of pathogen virus you wanted to produce typhus? Did you perform such experiments at Schirmeck?

A: No, no such experiments were performed. I don't know what the purpose would have been.

Q: Then if I may sum up, professor, you were introducing a vaccine into practice after it had already been tested in animal experiments in self-experiments and in experiments on volunteers. But experiments as 1 have just described were rot performed at Schirmeek, is that correct?

A: Yes, that is correct. We were merely introducing a vaccine which was already being used on a large scale in other countries. perhaps I may add that at first I intended to perform further vaccinations in the Schirmeek cap in order to protect this camp as far as possible, but that in the course of the next month, I realized that the Natzweiler camp was entirely different in its whole structure and that there was much greater danger of typhus in this camp. Therefore I shifted my interest from Schirmeek to Natzweiler.

Q: Now before we go on to the work at Natzweiler, witness, I should like to clarify the following point with you. Mr. Hirz testified here that the prisoners used for vaccination were not volunteers; but you say, Professor, that your point of view is that experimental subjects should be volunteers. Can you please clearly answer this question and explain the points of view which are important in your opinion in vaccinations particularly?

A: The prisoners whom we vaccinated were not volunteers. I would like to say the following on that point:

As I have already said, I share with most scientists the point of view that the prerequisite for any experiment is the self-experiment. This was not merely a theory in my case. Every one who knows my work or saw my work knows that I performed a number of self-experiments and contracted a number of infections. I need not go into that now, but of course I tested all vaccines on myself. In this present case, if we dispensed with the clement of voluntariness, I must state that according to our rules and laws in Germany, vaccinations are ordered wherever there is danger of an epidemic. This situation existed in Schirmeek and Natzweiler. There was a decree for this camp from the SS-WVHA, and decrees were sent out by the chief doctor of concentration camps. Our vaccinations were performed within these legal regulations. In the records of the trial, I find again and again the point of view that I had taken poor, helpless prisoners and treated them with murderous germs. But if one knows my work well, one can see that on the contrary I was combating those diseases. There can be no question of any criminal experiments here. I want to object very definitely to being called a criminal when I was merely fighting diseases.

Q: Well, Professor, you say that in this case you dispensed with having volunteers because it was not an experiment, but rather a vaccination, and because it is your point of view that for vaccinations it is legally permissible to make them compulsory, that you were merely carrying out a legal measure under international law?

A: Yes, this was a vaccination with a vaccine which was already being used elsewhere in the world within the framework of general vaccinations carried out on the basis of the existing regulations.

Q: Professor, aside from the vaccinations against influenza which were touched upon this morning and the vaccinations against typhus which we have just been discussing, did you do any further work at Schirmeek?

A: No; I have already mentioned the influenza vaccination this morning and the vaccination against typhus.

Q: Was this work finished with your vaccinations in Schirmeek?

A: This was the first step; I wanted to develop yet a vaccine against epidemic typhus itself, that is, with louse typhus virus, In the course of the summer of 1943, this work was performed.

Q: Then, if I understand you correctly, you said that at the end of May 1943 the end of the first part of your work was reached and that you continued your work. Will you please briefly describe your work after May 1943.

A: As I have already said, we wanted to try to develop a living typhus vaccine against louse typhus, and in the course of the summer of 1943, we did so.

Q: Let me interrupt you a moment, witness. I should like to stick to the chronology of the document, if possible. You are speaking of the summer of 1943. I assume that you mean July and august. From the meantime, however, we have a document of the 15th of June 1943. Perhaps we can discuss it at this point and discover how this letter came to be written. That is Document NO-305, Exhibit 295, on Page 73 of the English Document Book XII. It is a letter from you dated 5 June 1945 to Oberstarzt [Colonel, Medical Corps.] Professor Dr. Rose. Will you please tell us how this letter came to be written? You write:

In supplementation of our telephone conversation

perhaps you will tell the Tribunal what proceeded this letter.

A: This is a letter referring to the establishment of a plant for producing vaccine. Professor Rose visited me in Kay 1943 and. we discussed two Questions, first of all the possible establishment of such a manufacturing plant, and also my taking over a position as consulting hygienist. That was the pre-history of this document.

Q: You speak of the.establishment of a production plant for vaccine. My next question refers to that. I quote from this document, NO 305, the last sentence:

My calculation is not right therefore, but, as Mr. Giroud indicates, thirty to forty persons are still required monthly for the manufacturing of 100,000 doses.

You said this refers to the establishment of a production plant for vaccine but this formulation, thirty to forty persons needed for the reduction of 100,000 doses monthly, but the prosecution drew the conclusion that thirty to forty experimental subjects were needed. Can you please explain that?

A: This report is a correction of the telephone conversation between Professor Rose and myself. I gave him the number of persons needed as personnel for the production plant. This statement had not been quite right; thus I corrected myself in this letter. I said that to produce 100,000 doses per month one would need a personnel of thirty to forty persons. I took these figures from a letter from Professor Giroud who told me upon my inquiry how much personnel he needed in producing vaccine.

Q: Then this has nothing to do with the experimental subjects, witness.

A: No, it has nothing to do with any experimental subjects.

Q: Now, will you please look at Document NO-306, Exhibit 296, page 74 in the English Document Book 12. It is a letter from Professor Rose to you, dated 9 June 1943. Mr. Rose writes that based on your original papers which he enclosed he had worked out a proposal for the inspector for setting up a production plant for vaccine. Do you mean the one that Rose and you had agreed upon? Or what connection does this letter have with any human experiment allegedly carried out by you?

A: This letter, too, has nothing to do with any experiments on human beings. Professor Rose merely said that he made an application for the establishment of a vaccine-producing plant, enclosing various documents. This second paragraph is an inquiry by Professor Rose whether he had heard anything from Department I and refers to my appointment as consulting hygienist with Air Fleet "Center", which later became Air Fleet "Reich". The next sentence:

It will take some until 2-F comes out with a new research order,

and so forth, was referring to the approval of money for the assignment on typhus research. I think I have explained the letter now.

Q: You said that the camp doctor of Natzweiler asked you for help and that you declared yourself willing to help in cleaning up the camp, especially in vaccination. So far, you have spoken of your work at Schirmek. When did you begin your work in Natzweiler proper?

A: It was my intention in the summer of 1943 to begin vaccination in the Natzweiler camp, but then unexpected difficulties arose which I must go into, because I think they are of significance for this trial. Professor Hirt, whose name I believe has been mentioned here repeatedly, the director of the Anatomical Institute in Strassbourg, was a member of the SS and researcher of the Ahnenerbe [Ancestral Heritage]. As SS officer he had learned through the camp that I wanted to perform vaccinations there. He then intervened because he thought if persons outside the SS or the WVHA wanted to work in the camp in some form or other we had to have approval for this, quite aside from the fact that I had beep asked to perform these vaccinations, etc. Professor Hirt told the camp doctor and myself that he was ready to get this approval and asked me to make a request to this effect to the Institute for Military Scientific Research. I had no connection with the SS or any sub-organization of the SS, nor did I know the inner organization of the SS. The application was made in the summer of 1943, I cannot remember the wording of the application exactly, but Hirt sent it on to the agency in question. I only know that the application said that I had asked for permission to vaccinate a certain number of camp inmates.

One had to make the limitation because I could produce the vaccine only in small quantities since the technical conditions did not yet exist at the institute for large-scale production. In this letter to Hirt I pointed out that there was no danger in vaccination with the new vaccine but that we had to expect a more or less strong reaction, especially a fever reaction in accordance with the variances in the individuals. I also pointed out that the people to be vaccinated had to be in good physical condition, so that they should be in more or less the same physical condition as our soldiers. I said this in order to conform with the general vaccination regulations. After some time I received from the Institute for Military Scientific Research an announcement that my request would be granted.

Q: Professor, on page 75 of the document book will you please look at Document NO-120, which is Exhibit 297. It is a letter from the Reichsfuehrer SS, Personal Staff, Institute for Military Scientific Research, dated 30 September 1943. It is signed by Mr. Sievers, and it is addressed to the Director of the Institute for Hygiene of the Reich University, Strassbourg. Mr. Sievers writes:

I confirm receipt of your request of 16 August 1943. I shall be glad to help you and have accordingly contacted the proper source to have the desired personnel placed at your disposal.

Is this the letter you meant, witness, when you said that you were given approval in principle to carry out these vaccinations?

A: Yes, this letter created the basic prerequisites for performing the vaccinations. If we disregard the fact that for epidemiological reasons the vaccinations were justified and even necessary, this letter I believe gives us a justification to perform them.

Q: Now, were you able to carry out the vaccinations?

A: No, that wasn't as simple as that unfortunately — I say "unfortunately" because precious time was lost and 1 was interested in protecting the camp as soon as possible, at least to the extent that there was no longer any danger of typhus. I informed the camp doctor of the con tents of this letter and asked that I be allowed to commence the vaccinations, but a considerable time passed and not until November did I receive notice that we could begin with the vaccinations.

Through Hirt's intervention, therefore, the whole affair had not been helped; it had even been delayed. Then, when I received the first hundred prisoners. I looked at them and I found that they were in such a condition that they were quite out of the question for vaccination. They were in very poor condition. I must say that they were prisoners that came from Auschwitz on the transport; I think eighteen of the people had already died. In such a group one really had no right to perform a vaccination. I did not do so and refused for medical reasons.

Q: And what did you do then, witness?

A: I informed Hirt of this. I wrote to him frankly that these people were out of the question for vaccination and I asked for men in good physical condition.

Q: Professor, will you please look at Document NO-121, Exhibit 293? It is in the English document book on page 78, and in the German on page 81. It is a letter from you to Professor Hirt, dated 15 November 1943. Do you mean this letter when you say that you wrote to Hirt? I shall read briefly:

On the 13th of November, 1943, an inspection was made of the prisoners that were furnished to me by the SS-WVHA, in order to determine their suitability for the tests which have been planned for the spotted fever vaccines.

Is this the letter?

A: Yes, this is the letter of 13 November 1943. I may point out in this letter that I asked for a hundred prisoners in good physical condition, as only in this way could I expect results which can be used for purposes of comparison.

Q: Professor, I have something to put to you from this document which is perhaps in contradiction — or which may be interpreted to be in contradiction — to your testimony hitherto: You say that you wanted to vaccinate these people and the first sentence of the document seems to indicate that. You write:

their suitability for the typhus vaccinations.

Further down, however, in the document you speak of testing a new vaccine. Again, further down, material which can be compared. One might conclude that these are not vaccinations but experiments. Is this not in contradiction of your testimony?

A: No, that is not in contradiction of my statements. It is apparently necessary for me to supplement my statements by saying the following: As I said, in the Natzweiler Camp I wanted to vaccinate a fairly large number of prisoners. The vaccine was ready as far as the laboratory was concerned; it had been tested in animal experiment; it had been tested in self-experiments, and on a small group of volunteers.

I therefore know that it aid not involve any longer danger for persons vaccinated and that the use of this living vaccine did not bring about any manifest disease. But when a new vaccine is used for the first time in practice it is to a certain degree an experiment, since the tolerance has still to be determined and that can be determined only on a large number of people. The dose still has to be determined, and the result of the vaccination still had to be checked on a large number of people. So I admit it is no doubt true that the use of a new vaccine for the first time in practice on a large number of people could still be considered an experiment. I should like to add that in the first large-scale application the titer values and blood were examined, of course, temperature taken and all other observations were carefully made, in order to get definite final impression of the effectiveness and tolerance of the vaccine. We had to do that; it was out duty. It was a big responsibility to introduce a new vaccine like this, even if one had already experience in a small experiment on one self and volunteers. But there in this trial the word, "experiment," has been grossly misused. In this sense our vaccinations were not an "experiment," They were tests and not experiments with any uncertain goal or purpose. One can hardly speak of criminal experiments here. And in every medical journal in the world, on almost every page, we find experiments at the sickbed, and I don't, think anyone has any objection to this word. And as far as human experiments are concerned, I should like to refer to advertisements which show the public attitude of an American firm, in picture magazines which I have seen myself: antiseptics like Listerine, where they speak of human beings on whom tests have been made as guinea pigs. For this reason alone I think the word, "experiment," is used in different senses.

Q: One term has not been cleared up yet in this document, and that is the last words, "comparable material," Can you please explain what that means?

What did you mean by "comparable material"?

A: That means that the investigations indicated have already been made and that the results were to be compared with one another, so that one can have really useful median results. The individual values of every immunologist varies considerably according to the constitution and general physical condition. That was one of the reason why I was very careful to get only persons in good physical condition for vaccination, since persons in poor condition react quite differently. Besides, I must point out that according to the general vaccination regulations, vaccination of any type can only be performed on healthy people, and I wanted to observe this rule strictly.

DR. TIPP: Mr. President, I am now coming to another subject. I should like to suggest recessing now. I think this would be a good point.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well; the Tribunal will be in recess.

(A short recess was taken.)